CERN scientists discover new subatomic particle that could be Higgs boson

What is the Higgs Boson?

Why the Higgs Boson matters…

Scientists at the CERN research centre have discovered a new subatomic particle that could be the elusive Higgs boson.

The results were announced at CERN headquarters near Geneva this morning

British physicist Peter Higgs (right) predicted the particle

Scientists at the CERN research centre have discovered a new subatomic particle that could be the elusive Higgs boson.

The Higgs boson is thought to give matter mass and is believed to be crucial in the formation of the universe.

The team working at the Large Hadron Collider outside Geneva has spent years looking for evidence of the subatomic particle.

The Higgs particle is the last undiscovered piece of the Standard Model that describes the fundamental make-up of the universe.

It is a hugely successful theory but has long had several gaps, the biggest of which is why some particles have mass and others do not.

CERN Director General Rolf Heuer said: “We have reached a milestone in our understanding of nature.

“The discovery of a particle consistent with the Higgs boson opens the way to more detailed studies, requiring larger statistics, which will pin down the new particle’s properties.”

Mooted by British physicist Peter Higgs in 1964, the boson is believed to exist in an invisible, ubiquitous field created a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang, 13.7bn years ago.

Bosons are non-matter particles which are force carriers, or messengers that act between matter particles.

The interaction gives rise to three fundamental forces – the strong force, the weak force and the electromagnatic force. There is a fourth force, gravity, which is suspected to be caused by a still-to-be found boson named the graviton.

When some particles encounter the Higgs boson, they slow down and acquire mass, according to theory. Others, such as particles of light – or photons – are impervious to it and have no mass.

Prof Higgs expressed joy at the latest likely discovery.

“I never expected this to happen in my lifetime and shall be asking my family to put some champagne in the fridge.”

Five sigma discovery

CERN uses a giant underground laboratory – the Large Hadron Collider – in order to search for the particle. Protons are smashed together at nearly the speed of light, yielding sub-atomic debris which is then scrutinised for signs of the fleeting Higgs.

The task is arduous because there are trillions of signals, occurring among particles at different ranges of mass.

Over the years, tens of thousands of physicists and billions of euro have been thrown into the search for the Higgs, gradually narrowing down the mass range where it might exist.

Two CERN laboratories – CMS and Atlas – worked independently of each other to avoid bias. They both found the new particle in the mass region of around 125-126 Gigaelectronvolts (GeV).

The teams said that the results were “five sigma,” meaning there was just a 0.00006% chance that what the two laboratories found is a mathematical quirk.

“The results are preliminary but the five sigma signal at around 125 GeV we’re seeing is dramatic,” said Joe Incandela, spokesman for one of the two experiments.

“This is indeed a new particle. We know it must be a boson and it’s the heaviest boson ever found. The implications are very significant and it is precisely for this reason that we must be extremely diligent in all of our studies and cross-checks.”

Advertisements

Share this:

Like this:

This extract is from an article in Archaeology, A publication of the Archaeological Institute of America Abstract Volume 61 Number 6, November/December 2008 by Sandra Scham ARCHAEOLOGY’s Washington, D.C., correspondent and a fellow at the American Association for the Advancement of Science

It is likely the megaliths at the Neolithic site of Göbekli Tepe in Turkey once supported roofs. Archaeologists have found floors constructed of burnt lime and clay within the stone circles–the earliest such floors ever discovered. (Haldun Aydingün)

Göbekli Tepe’s circles range from 30 to 100 feet in diameter and are surrounded by rectangular stone walls about six feet high. Many of the pillars are carved with elaborate animal figure reliefs. In addition to bulls, foxes, and cranes, representations of lions, ducks, scorpions, ants, spiders, and snakes appear on the pillars. Freestanding sculptures depicting the animals have also been found within the circles. During the most recent excavation season, archaeologists uncovered a statue of a human and sculptures of a vulture’s head and a boar.

As we walk around the recently excavated pillars, the site seems at once familiar and exotic. I have seen stone circles before, but none like these.

Left to right: T-shaped pillars at Göbekli Tepe depict two boars accompanied by ostrich-like birds, a crocodile-like creature, and vultures flying above a scorpion. (Haldun Aydingün)

Excavations have revealed that Göbekli Tepe was constructed in two stages. The oldest structures belong to what archaeologists call the early Pre-Pottery Neolithic A period, which ended around 9000 B.C. Strangely enough, the later remains, which date to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B period, or about 8000 B.C., are less elaborate. The earliest levels contain most of the T-shaped pillars and animal sculptures.

Archaeologist Klaus Schmidt downplays extravagant spiritual interpretations of Göbekli Tepe, such as the idea, made popular in the press, that the site is the inspiration for the Biblical Garden of Eden. But he does agree that it was a sanctuary of profound significance in the Neolithic world. He sees it as a key site in understanding the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture, and from tribal to regional religion.

Schmidt and his colleagues estimate that at least 500 people were required to hew the 10- to 50-ton stone pillars from local quarries, move them from as far as a quarter-mile away, and erect them. How did Stone Age people achieve the level of organization necessary to do this? Hauptmann speculates that an elite class of religious leaders supervised the work and later controlled the rituals that took place at the site. If so, this would be the oldest known evidence for a priestly caste–much earlier than when social distinctions became evident at other Near Eastern sites.

Another interesting viewpoint is presented by Nassim Haramein of the Resonance Project. He writes:

In 1994, a shepherd in Turkey discovered what may be one of the most important archeological sites to confirm the hypothesis of historic events in humanity’s evolution presented in the DVD set, “Crossing the Event Horizon.” There I discuss the concept that an advanced civilization was present on our planet prior to our written history and described in many different cultures as the Sun Gods coming from the stars, of which other evidence is found as well on previous posts in this blog. What this Turkish Bedouin found, and that was later excavated and investigated by a German archaeologist, Klaus Schmidt, is an 11,000 to 13,000 year-old elaborate structure from which only the supporting pillars remain. This makes the Gobekli Tepe site the oldest organized structured site ever discovered, pre-dating Stonehenge by approximately 6,000 years. It is important to understand that these dates refer to the end of the Stone Age period, where humans were barely out of caves and still only achieved very rudimentary tools and capacities. This period is commonly referred to as well as the hunter-gatherer period. Yet, this site shows a high level of sophistication complete with a floor and stone pillars, an average of 7-10 tons each and in some cases up to 50 tons, which have been moved from a local quarry at least ¼ mile away. Further, these remaining pillars, which only a few have been uncovered to date, are dressed with very intricate etchings and carvings including obvious written symbolic language which has yet to be deciphered and which predates the archeological model of the first writing by thousands of years.

Archeologists, in a rare occurrence of agreement, seem to all concur that the site is of great importance. However, there are many disagreements on how it came to be. Some try to associate the monuments with the hunter-gatherer population that seems to have been present at the time. Others attempt to rewrite archeological theories and hypothesize that humans settled in sedentary community structures much earlier than previously believed. In both cases, archeologists agree that it would have taken hundreds and hundreds of workers to accomplish such a task, and it is clear to me that the complexity, the technological means to move such large stones and the sophistication necessary to do the job was certainly not there in the human communities at the time, whether or not they were hunters or gatherers, or farmers. Furthermore, interestingly, this site is in the appropriate geographic region to be associated with what is described in the Judeo-Christian tradition as the Garden of Eden. From my research point of view, the Garden of Eden as described in the texts of the Bible is one of many traditions’ description of this early advanced civilization that seemed to have left its mark in our evolution all around the world in various structures and manuscripts, from the Egyptian tradition and Vedic texts to Mayan and Inca codices. I am excited about this archeological site and I look forward to further discoveries, as most of the monuments still lie under the sand, and maybe tombs will be found furthering our understanding of this evolution.

We’ve decided to do a round up of what many of the visionaries of our time have to say on the subject.

The famous astrologer, Jonathan Cainer, says:

We have all heard about 2012. It brings the end of the Mayan calendar and, depending on which gloom-laden website you visit, it threatens us with all kinds of trouble. Just in case you are wondering how seriously to take all of this, let me set your mind at rest. Solar flares won’t render us extinct, strange brown dwarf stars won’t tilt the Earth on its orbit, the end is not nigh and even the dreaded recession will slowly loosen its grip as the year goes by.

Another viewpoint is held by Dr Courtney Brown of the Farsight Institute who believes that what may or may not happen in 2012 is dependent on where our consciousness is, as remote viewing experiments seem more and more to back the view that timelines and events can be affected positively or negatively by the global consciousness. We already reported on his views and that can be read again here.

So what is true? If the remote viewing stats are to be believed perhaps all of the above! Following the multiple universe theories, all possibilities happen on different timelines. The problem with the remote viewing findings is that the thinking is so new, that it is akin to the middle ages when people first began to suggest that the earth might not be flat and that it might actually be traveling around the sun. In those days people died for posing such thoughts. However, in today’s world of cynicism and media saturation new thinking can get lost in the crowd and unfortunately just be completely ignored.

We really can’t afford to throw out this theory without trying it out, as if this theory is right it might just change our future in a radical way. The intention experiments run by scientists such as Dean Radin and Lynne McTaggart, demonstrate that our thoughts really have an effect on events and that in turn global events can affect our thoughts. If we get our consciousness to the right place and begin to realise that what and how we think on a global level may affect the timelines positively or negatively then it might just encourage us to start focusing on and choosing positive scenarios.

To conclude Nassim Haremein has some very interesting theories about the path of the sun through the solar system and why 2012 is seen as significant. The link below is his summary of where believes his theories and research are leading. But to really understand the physics behind what he believe is happening on a galactic level from 2012 onwards it is worth watching his whole presentation which begins with this link. Crossing the Event Horizon

Maybe 2012 can be the year when we start to accept that we have the ability to change our reality for the better by changing our thoughts and attitudes and imagining a whole new way forward?

Every day, we use materials from the earth without thinking, for free. But what if we had to pay for their true value: would it make us more careful about what we use and what we waste? Think of Pavan Sukhdev as nature’s banker — assessing the value of the Earth’s assets. Eye-opening charts will make you think differently about the cost of air, water, trees …

Pavan Sukhdev
A banker by training, Pavan Sukhdev runs the numbers on greening up — showing that green economies are an effective engine for creating jobs and creating wealth.

Now that’s what we call a tree house!

The Birds Nest

A new ecological development in Sweden, called the Tree Hotel, is creating a stunning architectural homage to the lungs of our planet – the trees.

Situated in a forest area, near the small village of Harads, which is located approximately an hour by car from Luleå (Kallax) airport, the Treehotel, is, according to its developers, “based on the genuine experience of nature so it’s a given that sustainability and ecological values are two pillars of our hotel operation.”

Aesthetically beautiful, while at the same time incorporating the best of modern and innovative design, the hotel plans to offer 24 rooms in all. Currently five treerooms are completed and a tree sauna for up to twelve people, situated among the centuries-old pines.

The developers say:

We build our treerooms in the natural forest while hardly affecting the surroundings. We choose material and construction techniques that make as little environmental impact as possible. We build on live trees without destroying the tree and we do not chop down any trees or damage nature while building. Mostly we use local construction companies.

Each room is unique. Not only the architecture but also its furniture, lighting and fabrics are custom designed. The rooms vary in size between 15-30 m², with the largest rooms accommodating up to four people.

We have chosen Eco outdoor wood floor, which doesn´t contain any chemical substances. The wood is heated to over 200 degrees, which triggers their intrinsic resistance to protect against destruction.

The treerooms all have good insulation and are warmed up by underfloor heating. The electricity is supplied locally from green hydroelectric power. And the lighting consists of low-energy LED-systems.

Daily operations have minimal impact on nature as well. The treerooms have no sewage system and when cleaning, we always use eco-friendly products.

Each room has a modern, environmentally friendly combustion toilet where everything is incinerated at 600 °C. The toilets are completely odourless and powered by electricity. Mirrorcube, on the other hand, has a freezing-toilet, also electrically powered and completely odourless. In winter, it also contributes to heating.

Bathrooms have water-efficient sinks with running water sufficient for washing hands, face and brushing teeth. All wastewater is collected in a container that is emptied daily. Showers are located in a separate building. (www.treehotel.se)

Treehotel was inspired by the film ”The Tree Lover” by Jonas Selberg Augustsen. The film tells the story of three men who live in the city and want to go back their roots by building a tree house together. “The Tree Lover” is a seen as a philosophical story about the significance of trees for us human beings.

Visit the site www.treehotel.se to see the interiors and to read more about this innovative development. In the meantime, here are some more pictures of the Treehouses.

With all the talk and speculation going on around October 28th and it’s association with Calleman’s projected “end” of the Mayan calendar, now is a very good time to look at what you choose to think and why.

There is certainly a sense of change growing on the Earth and even more so, there seems to be a real desire for positive change.

Whether October 28th has any real meaning in Mayan or astrological terms or not, doesn’t really matter as we are collectively giving it a meaning by looking towards it as representing something significant. We can harness this significance and choose to focus collectively on positive change.

So how do we do this? Mainly by letting go of fear.

“But this is a scary time!”, some people will argue. Yes it is. We are certainly not downplaying the real issues that are bubbling on this planet of ours. As global financial structures collapse and with them all the livelihoods and ideas of what a secure life and a secure future should look like, then of course fear can get a toehold on the collective consciousness.

Change brings with it a feeling of uncertainty and if uncertainty is not managed then fear can and will creep in. But we have to be realistic about change. The clue is in the word and change really does mean change. Even when the change is for the good the process that nudges this new way of experiencing the world can be uncomfortable and unsettling.

We can make change easier by flowing with it, staying in trust, reaching out to help each other and opening our minds to new ways of seeing and experiencing our daily lives. Or we can make it difficult by resisting, grumbling, wallowing in fear based thinking and walling ourselves away from our true selves and from each other.

In an earlier article, Dream the Earth Happy we listed some practical ways to create positive intention and vibration. Here they are again if you don’t want to go back and read the full article:

Stop feeding your mind with negative outcomes. That means be very discerning about watching news or reading newspapers. Either stop or at least be aware that for every bad story going on there are hundreds of good things happening that are never reported.

Find a positive angle in everything that you hear and actively look for positive stories..

Use vision boards and positive words to dream yourself happy and to include beautiful earth images so that a healthy, happy planet is always included in what you imagine.

If your thoughts are stressing you, depressing you or making you sad then ask for help. There are hundreds of wonderful teachers and methods out there that can help so have a look around and work with whatever system appeals to you.

Find a meditation practise that works for you. Learning to be with yourself in silence opens you to the much bigger you that lives within you…

Don’t listen to people who say that it’s so hard to become enlightened and all that sort of separatist thinking. That’s just another negative thoughtform disguised as a philosophy. A happy human being at peace with themselves and the world around them, doing his or her very best to consciously create a happier, healthier world is an enlightened human being. That’s all. It’s no big mystery and if you’re not feeling like that right in this moment you’re only a thought away from it!

The key to all of this is to be conscious. To live consciously and to remember that our time here is meant to be a joyful and fun experience. Remember that the news reports just give one side of the story. There have never been so many great teachers on the planet, so many people waking up and choosing to live consciously and so many ways in which to learn and experience conscious living.

And what does it even mean to be conscious? In essence it’s a way of simply living from the heart. A lovely book called Dance with Life by JM Hurley published by our sister site, is a simple story of a journey in learning the language of the heart and how to embrace conscious living.

To inspire you and show how simple the process can be we are publishing several extracts here from various parts of the book:

‘Do you know what it means to be alive?
Do you understand that life is only a moment, just one moment after another?
Do you understand that?
There is no going back, no skipping ahead, just the moment called now, just the feeling that you carry within you.
Do you realise how much time is lost by spending all the
yesterdays dreaming of tomorrows?
All the ‘should haves’ and ‘could haves’ are meaningless.
Tragedy is when you realise this too late.
Tragedy is when the first experience and understanding of this reality comes with the last breath.’
…

‘This is not a journey with outcomes,’ he said. ‘The journey is the destination. I can accompany you on this journey but it is your journey and I cannot take your steps for you. You need to feel it in your own heart. Face it with clarity and with courage.’
….

‘The inner voice can see in all directions,’ he replied. ‘To know yourself you must get to know your capacity in all directions. Good and bad are not qualities that exist outside. They are inside every human being. To be unaware of this would be to mislead yourself. Take time, let this settle. Look at what is around you; see things for what they are. Sometimes this will involve just seeing something exactly for what it is. Sometimes it will be to look beyond what is apparent. Listen to your gut feeling it is often a very good mouthpiece for the heart.’

…

Light is a real thing. It overpowers darkness on every level. I can’t remove another curtain and let darkness in to engulf the light. I can only create darkness by blocking out the light, but the light is always there, waiting for a chink through which it can pour. Even the smallest spark, the tiniest chink will let the light in. Never forget that. Even when it seems to be the darkest place, never forget that the light is there, waiting for the moment when you allow it to seep in.’
…

‘See this hand,’ he continued, holding one hand up, ‘imagine it’s your physical self with all its hopes and dreams. It has a finite route. It is made of the elements and it will return to the elements. Now see this hand,’ he said, holding the other up, ‘imagine this is the place inside that you have just experienced. This has been, is, and always will be.’
He joined his hands, interweaving the fingers. He smiled.
‘This is life. This is the merger of the finite and the infinite. Through the amazing feeling machine that is your finite self, your infinite nature can play in the symphony of life. With every breath the finite and the infinite meet. Their point of union is contained in that breath. It’s as close as the two realms can ever get to one another. The point of being alive, of understanding the nature of this breath is to feel and to experience this gift of life.’
…..

The heart feels no chaos. Its drumbeat is simplicity. Its desire is to be in love and to feel no duality. It is the happiness of contentment. Chaos lives in the mind, in the nerves, in the sinews. It feeds on turbulent emotions, on the rapidfiring of agitated brain cells; it battles against the simple calm of the soul. The dark night of the soul lives in the mind. Only the mind can create the very traps that lead it to self-destruct. …… Let no room for doubt in your heart. The heart is never off course. Trust in that.’
…..

Every unconscious moment sets the seeds for a future disaster.
There is always choice. You can choose to be swallowed by fear or you can choose to remove yourself from the control of fear. Do you have the ability to make that choice? Yes, because you are choosing to learn now about the process of living consciously.
……

‘The world!’ he exclaimed. ‘The world is a very peaceful rock floating in a very calm solar system. I don’t see Earth rushing at Venus or Mars, challenging them to a fight! And it has a very fortunate position, if it was anywhere else, Earth could be constantly bombarded by meteors. Instead it’s lucky to bump into something only every few million years or so. This world, this planet Earth, doesn’t need to seek peace, it already has it. It is people who create the wars, the random acts of violence, the hatred and destruction. And yet inside every human being is the most perfect peace. Every individual heart must seek that peace, must become conscious that everything connects, that taking responsibility for making the world a better place starts first within each person. Unconscious behaviour has a heavy cost.’
‘The heaviest cost being death,’ she said.
‘No,’ he shook his head. ‘The heaviest cost is in failing to notice life.’

…….

‘The true miracle of life lies in the breath and in the ability to experience the divine within. There are
no other miracles,’ he added, ‘plenty of unusual phenomena maybe, but no other miracles. Too often the unusual takes over and the truly miraculous is forgotten.’

….

And to conclude, if you haven’t already seen it the amazing and inspiring talk by Jill Bolte Taylor on what she calls her Stroke of Insight. A stroke at the age of 37 led Jill, a Neuroanatomist who specialised in brain research, not just to a new found medical understanding of brain function, but to a life changing meeting with her fully conscious, aware and blissful self…

Are the sequences formed by the ACGT nucleotidebases in DNA actually a language, capable of responding to and communicating with other languages?

Is the really exciting stuff actually in the so called 90% junk DNA?

A group of Russian scientists think so and according to Peter Gariev (Dr. Pjotr Garjajev) writing in the August 2009 edition of DNA monthly:

“Simply put, our position is that an organism’s genome cannot and does not consist of ninety-eight percent ‘junk’. Such thinking is nonsense from the perspective of evolution, which throws away anything unnecessary.” (DNA Monthly)

The following extract from the book by Jan Wicherink sums up their findings to date:

“While western science invested in the International Human Genome Project focusing on the 5% of the encoding triplets of DNA, in the Soviet Union in 1990 a group of Russian scientists of the Russian Academy of Sciences was formed to study the complete human genome. This research was led by Dr. Pjotr Garjajev, member of the Russian Academy of Sciences as well as the Academy of Sciences in New York. The Russian research was taking a wide angle and held an open view in their studies. The research team included bio physicists, molecular biologists, embryologists and even linguistic experts. Their research revealed that the supposed junk DNA that has been completely neglected and forgotten by western mainstream science, was no redundant leftover of evolution at all. Linguistic studies revealed that the sequencing of the codons of the non-coding DNA follow the rules of some basic syntax. There is a definite structure and logic in the sequence of these triplets, like some biological language. Research further revealed that the codons actually form words and sentences just like our ordinary human language follows grammar rules.

Scientists have conducted much research on the origins of human languages and the origins of the grammatical rules that are so essential to all human languages; however they have always failed to find the source. But now for the first time in history the origins of language may be surprisingly attributed to DNA. The language of the genes is much, much older than any human language that was ever uttered on this globe. It is even conceivable that the DNA grammar itself served as the blueprint for the development of human speech.

Whereas the western Human Genome Project deciphered the ‘machine language’ code of the DNA molecule, the structure of the DNA ‘bits’ formed by the sequence of nucleotides, Russian scholars discovered the higher level language present in DNA. Another amazing fact that Garjajev’s group discovered was that the DNA is by no means a closed book of life. He discovered that the text of the DNA book can be altered. The codons of the DNA string can be rearranged in different sequences. In other words the software of the human genome our DNA molecule can be reprogrammed! Research revealed that the triplets in the DNA string are able to exchange places.

Since the DNA was found to have a syntax and semantics akin to our human languages, it indicated that our currently restricted understanding of DNA serving only for the coding of the reproduction of proteins for the chemical make up of an organism, is only half of the story.

When in vitro DNA in test tubes was exposed to coherent laser light, the laser light spiralled along the DNA helix as if it was guided by the structure of the DNA molecule. The most amazing effect was noticed when the DNA itself was removed and the laser light kept spiralling! The vacuum of the space that was just previously occupied by the DNA had changed and something caused the laser light to keep spiralling. These effects have been measured and remained for quite some time after the DNA was removed. The effect is now becoming well known as the DNA phantom effect. Vladimir Poponin and his team of Russian Academy of Sciences repeated the work of Garjajev at the Hearthmath Institute in the U.S.A. Poponin concluded again that a field structure was formed in the physical vacuum even when the original DNA was removed. We’ve seen similar examples of vacuum changes before that could be attributed to torsion fields.

DNA programming

The most astonishing experiment that was performed by Garjajev’s group is the reprogramming of the DNA codon sequences using modulated laser light. From their discovered grammatical syntax of the DNA language they were able to modulate coherent laser light and even radio waves and add semantics (meaning) to the carrier wave. In this way they were able to reprogram in vivo DNA in living organisms, by using the correct resonant frequencies of DNA. The most impressive discovery made so far is that spoken language can be modulated to the carrier wave with the same reprogramming effect. Now this is a baffling and stunning scientific discovery! Our own DNA can simply be reprogrammed by human speech, supposing that the words are modulated on the correct carrier frequencies!

Whereas western science uses complicated bio chemical processes to cut and paste DNA triplets in the DNA molecule, Russian scientist use modulated laser light to do exactly the same thing. The Russians have proven to be very successful in repairing damaged DNA material in vivo!

In addition sound therapy is also widely used today and the fact that some frequencies promote calm and healing while others can agitate and upset may fit in with this idea that the frequencies actually communicate with the DNA and can help or harm it.

How much of this is being recognised by mainstream science is unknown, but, as with all outside of the box thinking, it can take time for the mainstream world view to adapt and change a paradigm.

After all, the idea that the world might actually be round was once an extremely radical and absolutely forbidden idea!

On Monday 12th September 2011, 65 year old Irish woman Teresa Treacy was told by Judge Daniel Herbert that he had no choice but to uphold the law and ordered that she be jailed for contempt of the court orders which had ordered her to allow the Irish Electricity Supply Board (ESB) to enter her land to instal electricity pylons. Teresa refused them entry and so now at the age of 65, she finds herself in prison.

She said: “The route is cutting through our forest and the old Whitethorn hedgerows. For over 25 years I have used all my time and energy getting our lands into a place of natural beauty and overnight it can be destroyed with high powered lines going through forests beside the old bridge, the old laneway and through the new Oak and Ash woods I planted over 20 years ago. I have spent many years replacing dead trees and cutting gorse with my hands. I filled containers with water from the river so that my forest is a model. All my trees have been pruned individually by me to promote their growth”

“My heart is broken by the thought that they may be uprooted and thrown away. I know I will never see them in their full glory but was satisfied knowing that others would enjoy them long into the future”

Ms Treacy outlined her objections in a number of letters to the ESB and arranged a number of meetings with them to request that the powerlines be constructed underground for the following reasons.

1) The Health & Safety risks, including cancer risks which are increasingly associated with overhead powerlines as a result of Electro Magnetic Fields (EMF).

2) The fact that she has always maintained and improved her land as a natural habitat which includes native trees, old and new, cared for and/or planted by herself for future generations as a sustainable natural resource, through which the ESB want to smash.

3) The fact that the undergrounding of powerlines is now considered to be best practice across Europe. Ireland and the ESB are at the bottom of the league in terms of catching up with international standards and the progress which has been made to ensure that underground powerlines are the progressive way forward.

The ESB were also pointed to a recent decision in 2006 to underground the Bantry (Colomane – Ballylickey) 38kV powerline, which arose out of intense local protest opposing the overgrounding of that line.

But what is most evident in this case is how much Ireland as a nation has lost its soul. This was a country that once enshrined the protection of trees in its Brehon Laws, a country who has songs that lament the loss of the forests at the hands of invading forces, and who is famous for fighting for justice and equality around the world.

Well what about standing up for its own heritage? Ireland is still a beautiful island but every day the beauty is eroded by poor planning decisions, ghost estates, architectural blights on a beautiful landscape and now angry wounds gashed across beautiful woodland and for what? Cost savings that show short term gain and long term devastation?

Is ESB not state owned? And who is the state? Is it not the people? And what is wrong with the people? Have they become so lost in the economic meltdown that they have forgotten that the true wealth of a nation lies in its natural resources, its heritage, its culture and its beauty? Well the rest of the world won’t accept that from Ireland. The nation which has done so much for other countries in their time of need must start doing the same for itself.

Fight for your woodlands Ireland, they are your soul and it is time to get your soul back. Ireland was once the centre of learning for the western world. There is no reason it can’t be that again but to regain its position it must claim back its true history and the bedrock for that history was firmly rooted in its deep connection to the trees.

The Ogham alphabet is based on trees. The Brehon Laws, a highly evolved and far seeing legal code, devoted a whole section to tree laws. Trees in fact are so intrinsically linked to the Irish psyche that until their importance is restored, Ireland will not thrive.

Letters of support can be sent to: Teresa Treacy/ Dochas/ Monthjoy Womens’ Prison/ North Circular RD/ Dublin 7/ Eire
To become involved, call Niall on 086 8444966.For MEDIA, email Teresa Treacy Support Group – teresatreacysupportgroup at riseup dot net

Now what will we do for timber,
With the last of the woods laid low?
There’s no talk of Cill Chais or its household
And its bell will be struck no more.
That dwelling where lived the good lady
Most honoured and joyous of women
— earls made their way over wave there
And the sweet Mass once was said.2. Ducks’ voices nor geese do I hear there,
Nor the eagle’s cry over the bay,
Nor even the bees at their labour
Bringing honey and wax to us all.
No birdsong there, sweet and delightful,
As we watch the sun go down,
Nor cuckoo on top of the branches
Settling the world to rest.3. A mist on the boughs is descending
Neither daylight nor sun can clear.
A stain from the sky is descending
And the waters receding away.
No hazel nor holly nor berry
But boulders and bare stone heaps,
Not a branch in our neighbourly haggard,
and the game all scattered and gone.4. Then a climax to all of our misery:
the prince of the Gael is abroad
oversea with that maiden of mildness
who found honour in France and Spain.
Her company now must lament her,
who would give yellow money and white
— she who’d never take land from the people
but was friend to the truly poor.5. I call upon Mary and Jesus
to send her safe home again:
dances we’ll have in long circles
and bone-fires and violin music;
that Cill Chais, the townland of our fathers,
will rise handsome on high once more
and till doom — or the Deluge returns —
we’ll see it no more laid low.

•Offaly woman Teresa Treacy deserves an award instead of a prison term for her courage and tenacity in resisting the ESB’s move to cut down her beloved trees.

The evergreens, oak, ash and birch that she has tended to are more than just lumps of inert or lifeless matter. They are among our most precious resources on this planet.

They beautify any landscape and lend character to even the dullest countrified scene that can greet the eye. They protect us from the elements — how many times have we run to seek shelter underneath a tree, confident that the loving canopy of its leaves and branches would save us from a ducking?

I think of the song often sung by the legendary Irish tenor John McCormack: “I think that I shall never see, a poem lovely as tree.”

And trees act as the lungs of our planet, in reducing the level of air pollution, sucking in carbon dioxide and exhaling life-giving oxygen. They remove substances like ozone and nitrogen oxides from the air, thus contributing to a healthier and less toxic environment.

From time immemorial, mystics have perceived angelic beings living in trees, and colourful auras radiating from them.

Whatever one makes of this claim, there can be no doubt as to their intrinsic value in the natural order of things. Teresa Treacy is certainly on the side of the angels in taking her stand against the tree choppers.

It’s the crooked bankers, corrupt politicians and greedy developers who should be tasting prison food, not this gentle but sturdy and determined woman, who has more decency in any one of her green fingers than all those betrayers of our nation combined.

Traditionally, living trees have played a central role in the practical daily and spiritual lives of the Irish people. They served as landmarks and bastions of family and clan identity, and their importance can be measured by great number tree-based place-names in Ireland – out of 16,000 town lands in Ireland, 13,000 are named after trees. Sacred trees were planted at holy wells, and churches were created at the site of sacred trees and groves. Cultural ceremonies and celebrations were often performed at a tree. When clans were at war, often they would target the enemy’s Monument Tree rather than their fortress or dwellings as the subject of an attack. Living trees have also provided an educational setting, from the groves of the ancient Celts, renowned throughout Europe, to the hedgerow schools of more recent times. Ogham, the native Irish alphabet was founded on tree associations. Irish myth, story, and music abounds with references to particular trees, and demonstrating the degree to which they were understood and valued by the people.

Living trees served as the foundation for a multi-layered ecosystem which provided an abundance of food crops and medicinal products made from fruits, nuts, seeds, leaves, flowers, stem, bark, and roots. They also provided food and habitat for animals, who were in turn used for food and clothing. Coppiced and sustainably managed woodland supplied a renewable source of wood tools and building materials. Indeed, the importance of trees in the lives of the Irish people can be gleaned by observing Brehon Law, Ireland’s native legal system, and the degree to which it protected living trees and discouraged unlawful felling. In essence, native woodlands provided the backdrop to and foundation for the development of Irish civilisation.

Submit an Article

Submit an article to The Noetic Digest by emailing katypress AT eircom.net
We will be happy to consider suitable content for inclusion.
Comments are welcome. However we ask that material for the comments section does not exceed 500 words.